Where’s the plan?
‘A jeepney driver’s additional daily expense increased by P1,300 due to fuel. That P5,000 only covers about three days of increased cost.’
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Daily Tribune‘A jeepney driver’s additional daily expense increased by P1,300 due to fuel. That P5,000 only covers about three days of increased cost.’
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Malacañang lives in an enchanted dimension as it maintains that everything is normal, telling the population not to panic despite petroleum prices hitting more than P100 a liter. Prices of all commodities have increased as a result.
Perched in their ivory towers, the nation’s officials are oblivious to the fact that many are receiving insufficient aid. Not all who are crying for government assistance have received it.
Businesses are also affected and are trying to cut costs to survive, which affects employment and wages.
What was hyped as “ayuda” or a subsidy covered only 360,000 drivers, according to the Department of Social Welfare and Development, against 2.2-million transport workers who drive jeepneys, tricycles, motorcycle taxis, Grab cars, and delivery vehicles—all told 1.8-million Filipinos missing out on assistance.
Ibon Foundation executive director Sonny Africa said the P5,000 aid is not enough to sustain a driver through successive fuel price increases.
“A jeepney driver’s additional daily expense increased by P1,300 due to fuel. That P5,000 only covers about three days of increased costs,” he said.
There is no sense of urgency in the proposals to address the impact of rising prices, since Congress is on break and there are no plans for a special session to address the crisis.
“What angers us is that while ordinary Filipinos suffer, billionaires and oil companies are protected. Why not impose even a small wealth tax of 1 percent, 2 percent, or 3 percent on billionaires? That could generate up to P500 billion for aid, while they still retain trillions,” according to Africa.
The government should develop a long-term crisis strategy since even if the war ends, it will take some time for everything to return to normal.
“If we look at the last spike in crude oil prices in 2022, even when prices stabilized after Russia invaded Ukraine in February, it took almost until the end of the year for prices to return to previous levels. So it ran for at least six months before going back down,” Africa recalled.
The current situation involves a larger battlefield and higher price increases, which means the impact will last longer.
Responding to the crisis must start with accepting that the situation is already far from normal.
If the government does nothing or very little, then all the price increases will be shouldered entirely by ordinary Filipinos.
The poor and the middle class — who have nothing left to give — must not bear the burden of the crisis.
The government has a major role to play in alleviating the price shocks, as only it has the power to act quickly to cushion the severe impacts.
The signals from the Palace, however, are not encouraging. While Congress has passed the bills granting emergency powers to the President to reduce or suspend the excise tax, “it remains unclear if this will actually happen.”
“Even the oil deregulation law is just being studied carefully,” Africa said.
It is lamentable that to the Palace, a crisis does not exist.
“Some officials even call those raising concerns ‘fearmongers.’ If we take their statements at face value, it seems they see no crisis. That’s what’s so puzzling. Maybe in the Palace, the minimum salary is P250,000 a month, that’s why,” he said.
With P1 trillion in public funds squandered over the past three years on pork barrel and kickbacks, the government cannot claim it has no resources.
It simply chooses not to act.
